Even Stalin could not eliminate Jehovah's Witnesses

The Jehovah's Witnesses—one of the largest
religious
organizations in the world—may be banned in Russia because of the
distribution
of extremist literature. In several cities adherents of this
organization have
already found themselves outside the law. Law enforcement agencies
have pursued
Jehovists for several years, and after the adoption of the
antiextremist law in
the country several regional congregations have been liquidated
and witnesses
have been subjected to criminal prosecution. However in the past
year the
prosecutor general began a decisive attack on Jehovah's Witnesses,
threatening
to enter the organizations into the list of extremists. In that
case, all of
its branches will be closed and the Jehovists themselves, who
number in Russia
about 100,000, will be deprived of the possibility of openly
professing their
religious views.

On Monday, 16 January, a Moscow city court
declined to
satisfy an appeal filed by Jehovah's Witnesses against the action
of the
prosecutor general's office. Thereby the decision of a lower
instance, which
earlier had recognized as legal the warning about the
impermissibility of
committing extremist activity issued by the prosecutor's office
against the Administrative
Center of Jehovah's Witnesses, remained in force.

Attorneys for the organization have pointed out
that in the
ruling of the agency there are several legal contradictions.
Eighty-eight
publications of Jehovah's Witnesses structures have been ruled to
be extremist
in Russia. Deputy prosecutor general Viktor Grin concluded that
this fact is
sufficient to issue a warning to the central office of the
organization. At the
same time the Jehovists themselves maintain that the offices of
the prosecutor
that initiated an investigation of these materials have
consistently opposed
the statements of the Administrative Center in the trial of this
case.

"When the prosecutor's office acted with an
initiative
one after another to find our books and brochures extremist, then
the
Administrative Center sent to the court a petition that the
organization be
included in the case as an interested party, so that we would be
able to join
the case and defend these publications, doctrinal books of our
religion.
However the prosecutor's office protested that we would
participate in the
case. They maintained that the Administrative Center is neither
the author nor
publisher of these materials. These are conducted by foreign
organizations. It
turns out that we have nothing to do with the publication of the
forbidden
books and brochures, but in the end the case is turned against us.
That is, the
office of the prosecutor general contradicts its own position," a
representative of the press service of the Administrative Center
of Jehovah's
Witnesses, Ivan Belenko, told Open Russia.

How they can now correct the "violations," the
Jehovists do not fully understand. Belenko said that the
prosecutor's office
has not demanded the removal from circulation of the materials
ruled to be
extremist: "We did this on the basis of our own decision. All
local
religious organizations that are members of our structure were
sent letters
requesting that they stop distributing materials banned by courts,
which was
also done."

The Russian branch of the Jehovah's Witnesses
does not any
longer order books and brochures that are included in the Federal
List of
Extremist Materials. This argument was left without attention in
court and the
prosecutor's office continues to, and the prosecutor's office
continues to
expand the collection of accusations, searching for old
publications that were
distributed in Russia in prior decades. In order to fine believers
and to file
lawsuits for the liquidation of regional branches, prosecutors in
particular
have used falsified testimony, Belenklo thinks.

Jehovists have counted now more than 60 cases
where law
enforcement agencies or persons obviously cooperating with them
were guilty of
forgery. Several of these incidents were captured by cameras of
video
surveillance. Belenko maintains that courts have refused to
include these video
tapes in materials of cases.

He said that the most egregious case occurred
in Voronezh in
October of last year. To conduct a worship service, local
activists of
Jehovah's Witnesses rented the "Energiia" sports complex. More
than
600 persons assembled for the event, but just at the time of the
addresses of
the elders, personnel of the police burst into the premises and
halted the
service. Eyewitnesses describe how the police inspected the bags
and pockets of
believers. Operatives found a package with forbidden books in
flowerbeds on
stage.

Jehovists insist that these books were planted
on them in
the night before the service. They said that police obviously knew
where to search.
As a result, the Voronezh court suspended for 45 days the activity
of the local
religious organization, finding the congregation guilty of
distributing
extremist materials.

As of today, seven regional branches of
Jehovah's Witnesses
have been liquidated by judicial decisions. Four of them—in
Belgorod, Stary
Oskol, Orel, and Elista—were liquidated by courts in 2016, and in
2015 a branch
in Abinsk was closed and the Samara and Taganrog branches were
closed in 2014
and 2009 respectively. Also in Taganrog 16 persons were convicted
for
continuing the activity of the congregation.Now four criminal cases have been opened
with regard to
adherents of the Jehovah's Witnesses religion. In three cases the
charges were
based on article 282 (Inciting hatred or hostility) and in one
case on article
239 (Creation of a noncommercial organization infringing the
rights of
citizens).

Thus in the Sergiev Posad city court a criminal
case is now
being considered that was opened with regard to elders of the
local
congregation, Viacheslav Stepanov and Andrei Spivak. The
accusation was issued
against them back in 2013 on the basis of operational audio and
video
recordings of believers' meetings that the operatives got with the
aid of
hidden cameras mounted in handbags.

Initially Stepanov and Spivak were accused of
making
statements that incited religious enmity and quoting forbidden
brochures that
contained negative characterizations of other religious
organizations. After
consideration of arguments presented by both sides and the conduct
of a repeated
psycho-linguistic expert analysis, on 4 March the Sergiev Posad
court acquitted
both elders, with the right of rehabilitation, but by the end of
May a Moscow
provincial court overturned this decision and returned the case
for a new
consideration.

The first mention of Jehovah's Witnesses in
Russia dates to
1877. While the organization was officially registered in the
Russian empire in
September 1913. Under the soviet regime Jehovists were subjected
to
persecutions and they were arrested and exiled to the most distant
parts of the
country. In 1951 members of the Jehovah's Witnesses along with
their families
were exiled from western Ukraine (the site of their main location)
to Siberia,
Kazakhstan, and the Far East, which facilitated the spread of the
ideas of this
organization in places of exile.

The Jehovah's Witnesses received official
registration in
the Russian federation in March 1991, and in the next year there
occurred for
the first time in history an international congress of the
organization on the
territory of the former USSR. The Russian Orthodox Church
immediately
determined their attitude toward Jehovah's Witnesses, consigning
them to the
category of religious organizations harmful for the church,
society, and the
state. Despite this, in March 1996 by order of President Boris
Yeltisn exiled
Jehovists were completely rehabilitated and recognized as victims
of political
repression.

The principal phase of the campaign against
Jehovah's
Witnesses began in 2008. At that time a letter was sent to all
branches of the
prosecutor's office, signed by deputy prosecutor general Viktor
Grin, requiring
the start of a mass inspection of the activity of all
congregations. After this
throughout Russia there began searches and arrests of Jehovists;
worship services
were regularly interrupted; and religious books associated with
the
organization were one after another placed in the list of
extremist materials.

Two years earlier, the Golovin district court
of Moscow
ordered the liquidation of the Moscow congregation of Jehovah's
Witnesses and
its activity was prohibited. Attorneys of the organization filed
suit in the
European Court of Human Rights, which in 2010 established the
occurrence of
violation of a number of articles of the European Convention in
the Russian
court's decision banning the activity of the capital division of
Jehovists. The
registration of the congregation was restored only in 2015, ten
years after its
prohibition.

As of the present, in Russia Jehovah's
Witnesses occupy
sixth place in the number of registered religious associations,
trailing
Orthodox, Muslim, Pentecostals, Baptists, and Adventists.

"It is hard for us to say why actions of law
enforcement agencies regarding Jehovah's Witnesses have been
activated at this
time. Whatever we may say on this will be speculation. But for us
this is not
something unexpected or surprising. Everything that is happening
now in the
country only confirms the prophetic words of Jesus Christ to the
effect that
his followers will be hated, persecuted, and prosecuted," Belenko
says.

The organization thinks that the prosecutor
general's
warning issued to the Administrative Center will lead to a new
round of the
campaign against Jehovah's Witnesses, "discriminating and
restricting
religious liberties," If the Administrative Center is closed and
included
in the list of extremist organization, the threat of liquidation
will face all
regional branches, which now number about 400 throughout the
country.

However, the Jehovists are Stoic minded. "It is
possible to liquidate judicially, but faith remains an integral
part of a
person. The constitution says that nobody can be forced to
renounce his
opinions or convictions. Nothing prevents us from professing our
religion," Belenko added. "This is just the first warning; in the
future we will appeal it in both domestic and international
instances."

The director of the "Sova" Center for News and
Analysis, Alexander Verkhovsky, also thinks that it is premature
to speak of
the liquidation of the Jehovah's Witnesses. He recalls that the
law does not
precisely establish a number of possible warnings, but in practice
an
organization is usually closed after two warnings.

"The Jehovah's Witnesses are not the first
religious
organization in modern history that was persecuted by law
enforcement agencies,
but this is a special case. The pressure on them has extended now
for eight
years, and in all this time its case has not been understood. Some
of the
charges against them are ridiculous, but of course it is possible
to expect the
closing of the central department of Jehovah's Witnesses, and in
that case
other representatives of the organization should be closed,"
Verkhovsky
notes.

The rights activist thinks that persecution of
Jehovists is
not a part of a trend of enforcement of the norms of antiextremist
legislation
connected with recent cases regarding Krishnaites, protestants,
and other
religious organizations: "Whereas in the case of Krishnaites or,
for
example, Seventh-day Adventists, the issue is local abuses
provoked by the
'Yarovaya Package," that is, there is no basis for their
elimination, but
in the case of the Jehovah's Witnesses such a basis apparently
exists. Although
I do not understand how it can be achieved; even Stalin was not
able to
eliminate them." (tr. by PDS, posted 20 January 2017)

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